Day 1 or 1000 all welcome on the tulips and snowdrops thread 🌷

[AFmammaG]

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/alcohol_support/4930949-tulips-snowdrops-and-another-day-1?page=40&reply=134961706

Ladies I’m making this new thread as we’ve gone up to 993 posts on the other thread and I need to link it before we fill up!

Will post a proper into later.

Well you're posting here, so there is something about your relationship with alcohol that isn't making you happy.

You seem pretty fantastic to me. Some of the support you've given to other posters on the thread is brilliant.

You CAN make the change. I bet you've overcome some tough things in life.

The journey doesn't have to be perfect. There's no prizes. Just one day at a time.

This is the thing I've overcome a horrible depression when my parents died suddenly when I was 22, and loads of other issues since then. I've made a life for myself. So why the hell can I not just stop picking up the drink?? I have a good job, friends, a child, a partner. What the hell

That's the million dollar question isn't it.

I'd say most, if not all, of us on here are very strong, exceptional women who have kept going through a tonne of shit.

Alcohol and the role it holds in our mind, what we think it gives us or does for us, is insidious.

Don't fixate on what you think you haven't achieved. Change your mindset to focus on what you HAVE.

You're bloody brilliant. You're massively strong. This is part of the process.

About a second after I posted DH ran in shouting the words that send me spiralling “DS has had an accident”. Fortunately, it wasn’t serious and a few wipes and plasters later and I think we had it under control. The migraine feels better anyhow! Good distraction.

I had to post for @Shiningout having caught up on the thread, which was unusually busy for a Friday night 😉 yes to we have all been there. Yes to the dry days still count. And yes to progress isn’t a straight line.

Gosh. We have been doing this for years. It’s not an easy habit to break. It takes so much time to build new habits. Healthy ones. To change our mindset that drinking isn’t good for us and actually makes things worse ☹️

I look at the welcome our newbie @SadMama87 received. I look at the people running to the thread to reassure @Shiningout that this isn’t the end of the world and I feel so proud. @NextPhaseOfLife mentioned that we are a group of strong, successful women all reaching a point in our lives that enough is enough and I couldn’t agree more. I might drink too much on occasion. I might have realised this isn’t the way I want to live and I’m doing something about it. Some of us may succeed first time. Some of us it may take longer. And some of us may ‘disappear’ and rejoin at a later date… There’s no right or wrong.

What I will say though, is that I am so proud of all of us!

I'm proud of you all too (and not just because I had a beer 😂😭) and am grateful for this thread and the support I've had tonight. Going to bed now and starting tomorrow at day 1.

Day 2 done ✅. Thank you lovely ladies for my warm welcome. I set a firm boundary on alcohol in our home moving forward and it is going to be phased out, with a plan in place for him, and for me to fully abstain.

I am an all or nothing kinda gal, so moderation doesn’t work with me.

Day 5- success. But, online shopping has arrived. I got a bottle, as I said I'm moderating I only planned on drinking one bottle on a Saturday. The thing is I feel nothing. I don't know if that's a good thing. I'm not looking forward to it, I'm not disappointed, I just don't care.
I feel like I've bought it out of habit, this was a once a week 'treat" but after falling into a hole with it I don't see it as a treat anymore.
I don't know what I'm trying to say, I'm not making much sense. Just trying to jot down these thoughts.

It's been around 7 months since I managed 5 days without. Maybe a part of me wanted to keep going.

Morning all. It’s Day 4 and the first day of summer. I’m hangover free and starting to feel a lot brighter - BUT I have a monthly event today that makes me really nervous and I’ve never done it without a drink to ‘steady my nerves’. I’m trying to focus on the end of the day as DH wants to have a takeaway to celebrate my success so far. Wish me luck!

@IncognitoUsername I found concentrating on the food helped. You enjoy it more sober. Just focus on that. Think about what you're ordering, what size, dips?
Have a nice night and good luck

It can be quite difficult interpreting the smoke signals can’t it! I wonder if the lack of excitement is the key bit - you don’t actually want it?

Great end of night message from OP too! And yes, so likely to have all been going / currently going through shit - and lord knows I wouldn’t judge anyone for managing it with alcohol (certainly I did). It has taken a while but I eventually realised - one life. This is it. No rehearsals, no do overs, nothing. There are no saviours and white knights coming to fix things - there is only us. And do I want my life to be fat, saggy, drunk, chain smoking caricature of the person I actually want to be, or do I go and be the person I want to be?

good job on Day 2 @SadMama87 that sounds really positive. It’s all worth it I promise!

Morning all,

@AFmammaG - thank you SO much for this thread. It's really wonderful 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

@SadMama87 - brilliant job - I love the idea of a plan - did you have a heart to heart?

@CoffeeLover90 - that's massive progress. Like you pre-ordered a massive bar of chocolate for a 'treat' day, and now it's here, you find you actually don't want it.

My take is still the 'one day at a time' approach. Would you buy it today if it wasn't there? Sounds like you wouldn't.

If this encourages anyone on here to keep going I will confirm the beers last night did fuck all for me and I feel really crap today with a headache. It's not bloody worth it 😭

Morning all, it’s the first day of the month and the sun is shining. I had a lie in and then fruit for breakfast. June is my month 💪 I feel so positive. I keep thinking it’s 7 weeks until the summer holidays, I still have time to make a real change and enjoy the summer sober and healthy.

I’m enjoying the updates, it’s exactly where I was about 90 days ago. The agonising over whether to drink or not. The small wins in those first few weeks. The slow realisation that life can be better. It does get easier, I promise. One thing I have found over time is this new confidence. I’m starting to trust myself again. It really is wonderful.

@CoffeeLover90 I vividly remember one night that I had a bottle of wine. I had that agonising over whether to drink it or not. I opened it and didn’t enjoy the taste. I forced my way through the bottle and I didn’t even feel drunk (which was always my aim). I just felt sick. And tired.

Trying to moderate regularly is never going to be for me and in all honesty I don’t think I will spend the rest of my life dry either. But if I can change the balance in my life. If I can feel in control. If I can do a month of nothing followed by one slip and then another month of nothing, for me that is what success looks like.

@Shiningout please don’t be too hard on yourself. Fresh start today. A chance to refocus. Try and think about all the beers you didn’t drink last week. You can do this!

Good luck @IncognitoUsername. I will admit I have been a bit of a chicken and avoided the events I know I will struggle at. I would try and focus on that take away. It will taste all the better without a belly full of wine first!

@Shiningout Maybe you needed that blip to realise it's not worth it. You can tell yourself it's not worth it but it's not until you do it that you realise it's true.
Could be the case here, I needed to buy that bottle to realise it's not important. I can take it or leave it.

Since commenting a friend has asked to call in tonight for a catch up. I'll share it with her as there's no part of me wants to sit and drink this alone.

@TimesaChangeling quitting smoking this year has been life changing for me. Honestly. Something I have been struggling with all my adult life.
I do vape in the evenings at the weekend but there is no ash, there is no butt, there is no awful smell and there is no hiding in the garden under an umbrella cursing myself. No shame buying a packet at the corner shop (again). No hiding my cigarettes from the kids. And my breathing is different. I had no idea how much it was damaging my breathing because I had got used to it. Just in 3 months I can still feel so much difference.

There is such a calm feeling about knowing you have what you are craving in the house, and you have allowed yourself to have it. It makes you think you can do without it.

I had my first night without chocolate last night - I told myself I couldn't have it for a month, and that is what I shall do. And it reminded me of how I started this alcohol free journey. So much easier to say 'absolutely not.' I didn't want that beautiful bar of whole nut at all ...

I'm also appreciating all the other updates - they help me feel strong in my resolve - but also to know that none of us are alone. It's not us, it's the alcohol that's the problem.

Lots of good advice coming from lots of strong women who have resolved to try and change. Every small step is a win.

@AFmammaG this is my next step. Can I ask did you use vapes to stop or cold turkey? I used champix in the past, was awful. Did terrible things to my mind. I had a reaction to patches too.

@CoffeeLover90 I tried pretty much everything… I did the throat lozenges. They were disgusting. I tried cold turkey, which was fine until I drank. I got a refillable vape but I didn’t get on with it and abandoned that attempt. What worked for me was a disposable vape. I think the refillable didn’t work properly or I might have got nicotine free liquid, so obviously didn’t do anything. The disposable one was much better.
The first weekend I vaped so much when I woke up I could taste flavoured liquid running between my nose and throat 🤣 so gross! But once I got through that weekend I realised I could do it and have slowly decreased the use so I just vape Friday and Saturday evening for a couple of hours. Hopefully I’ll phase that out eventually.

@AFmammaG thanks, I'll try this when it comes to it. I've so many changes to make it would be challenging to do them all at once. I've stopped twice, the first for 8 month. Then again when pregnant.
Refill vapes were horrendous, there was always something needing replaced and I found the liquid didn't last long.

Unfortunately I can’t get out of this one!

I did it! And people commented on how good it was, so obviously I never needed the ‘Dutch courage’ that I thought I did.
And this buzz is better than anything I’d get from alcohol.

@IncognitoUsername Brilliant! Enjoy your well deserved take away. What you getting? I'm going to allow myself one tonight. Done a lot of house work and gardening, a long walk planned tomorrow. I'll burn it off